Women's labor force transitions in connection with childbirth: a panel data comparison between Germany,Sweden and Great Britain

In this paper we make use of the panel aspects of the German GSOEP, the Swedish HUS and the British BHPS data. In these data sets we known month and year of childbirth and the month to month labor force status of the mother also before giving birth. This permits analysis of labor force transitions triggered by child births of different birth orders. From macro data Swedish women are known to have the highest labor force participation. The difference in total labor force participation of women is totally a result of fewer mothers entering the labor force and entering later in Germany and Great Britain than in Sweden. This paper shows that before birth of first child there is no such difference. We find that German and British women have even higher full-time labor force participation than Swedish women 12 months before the birth of the first child. The difference is more pronounced for second and third births than for first births. We suggest that these differences are caused by different family policy regimes where Germany can be characterized as a breadwinner regime and Sweden a regime oriented towards equal role sharing of father and mother. Our results on determinants of being in the labor force both after and before the birth of a child as well as determinants of the tempo of entering the labor force after birth shows that women's own human capital is important both in Germany and Great Britain, whereas in Sweden also less educated women have entered the labor force by the time the child is 2 years old.All correspondence to Cécile Wetzels. We are grateful to Andrew McCulloch from ESRC Research Centre on Micro-Social Change in Britain, who delivered the British BHPS-data. We also want to thank John F. Ermisch, Siv Gustafsson, Diane Sainsbury and two anonymous referees for useful comments. Financial support has been received by the Swedish Council in the Humanities and Social Sciences and the EU Human Capital and Mobility (HCM) network for the Female Labour Force Participation Network within which framework this analysis has been carried out. Responsible editors: S. S. Gustafsson, John R Ermisch.     

Outsourcing of Housework and the Transition to a Second Birth in Germany

The struggle that women face in reconciling their work and family roles is one of the main explanations proposed for the rapid decline in fertility rates in some developed countries. This study examines the role of the outsourcing of housework in reducing such role incompatibility and in increasing fertility among women in Germany—a country with below-replacement fertility rates, which enacted a series of large-scale schemes from the beginning of the 1990s that give incentives to households to outsource housework. Based on Goode’s role strain theory and by using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel, this study analyzed whether women who outsourced housework after the birth of their first child had a higher probability of having a second child. A survival analysis of 3990 person years demonstrates that, controlling for observables, the outsourcing of domestic labor is positively associated with a higher probability of a subsequent second birth in German women.     

Does granting citizenship to immigrant children affect family outmigration?

This study examines the effect of birthright citizenship on the outmigration behavior of migrant families in Germany. Using the introduction of birthright citizenship on 1 January 2000 and cohort-level data from the German Microcensus from 2001 to 2006, I exploit the differential treatment of birth cohorts around the enactment date to conduct a regression discontinuity analysis. Comparing the outmigration behavior of foreign-citizen families with children born in Germany directly before and after the cutoff, I find evidence that granting citizenship to immigrant children reduces the likelihood that their parents leave the country again.     

Choosing children over career? Changes in the postpartum labor force behavior of professional women

In recent years, the popular press in the U.S. hasrepeatedly profiled professionalwomen who have elected to leave the labor force inorder to devote their full-timeenergies to child rearing. The conclusion of thesearticles is often that mothers havetired of trying to be superwomen and have decidedthat high achievement in thelabor force is not compatible with a successful homelife. The purpose of this paperis to explore whether this impression is, in fact,based in truth. Using a sample ofprofessional women drawn from the PSID during theyears 1968–1992, we estimatethe probability of withdrawing from the labor forceat one, two and five year intervalsafter the birth of a child. We use several differentmeasures of labor force withdrawaland find that women who gave birth in recent years aremore likely to report zero hoursof work two years after the birth of a child when comparedto women who gave birthearlier in the sample period. Thus, we find some supportfor the conjecture that moreprofessional women are opting to stay home and raisechildren in lieu of aggressivelypursuing their careers. We do not find any differencesby cohort, indicating that thisphenomenon cuts across women of all childbearingages. However, our results are notrobust across different measures of labor forcewithdrawal, nor are they consistent acrosspostpartum time intervals.     

Happiness: Before and After the Kids

Understanding how having children influences parents’ subjective well-being (“happiness”) has great potential to explain fertility behavior. We study parental happiness trajectories before and after the birth of a child, using large British and German longitudinal data sets. We account for unobserved parental characteristics using fixed-effects models and study how sociodemographic factors modify the parental happiness trajectories. Consistent with existing work, we find that happiness increases in the years around the birth of a first child and then decreases to before-child levels. Moreover, happiness increases before birth, suggesting that the trajectories may capture not only the effect of the birth but also the broader process of childbearing, which may include partnership formation and quality. Sociodemographic factors strongly modify this pattern. Those who have children at older ages or who have more education have a particularly positive happiness response to a first birth; and although having the first two children increases happiness, having a third child does not. The results, which are similar in Britain and Germany, suggest that having up to two children increases happiness, and mostly for those who have postponed childbearing. This pattern is consistent with the fertility behavior that emerged during the second demographic transition and provides new insights into low and late fertility.     

Job continuity among new mothers

In the early 1990s, both state and federal governments enacted maternity-leave legislation. The key provision of that legislation is that after a leave of a limited duration, the recent mother is guaranteed the right to return to her preleave employer at the same or equivalent position. Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, we correlate work status after childbirth with work status before pregnancy to estimate the prevalence, before the legislation, of returns to the preleave employer. Among women working full-time before the pregnancy, return to the prepregnancy employer was quite common. Sixty percent of women who worked full-time before the birth of a child continued to work for the same employer after the child was born. Furthermore, the labor market behavior of most of the remaining 40% suggests that maternity-leave legislation is unlikely to have a major effect on job continuity. Compared with all demographically similar women, however, new mothers have an excess probability of leaving their jobs.     

Motherhood,labor force behavior,and women’s careers: An empirical assessment of the wage penalty for motherhood in britain,germany, and the united states

Using harmonized longitudinal data from the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS), the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP), and the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY), we trace career prospects after motherhood for five cohorts of American, British, and West German women around the 1960s. We establish wage penalties for motherhood between 9% and 18% per child, with wage losses among American and British mothers being lower than those experienced by mothers in Germany. Labor market mechanisms generating the observed wage penalty for motherhood differ markedly across countries, however. For British and American women, work interruptions and subsequent mobility into mother-friendly jobs fully account for mothers’ wage losses. In contrast, respective penalties are considerably smaller in Germany, yet we observe a substantial residual wage penalty that is unaccounted for by mothers’ observable labor market behavior. We interpret this finding as indicating a comparatively more pronounced role for statistical discrimination against mothers in the German labor market.     

Labor supply behavior of prospective and new mothers

Utilizing unique data generated from the National Longitudinal Surveys of Young Women, this paper examines the labor force participation of young mothers in the months immediately preceding and following the birth of the first child. Labor supply behavior at this point in the life cycle is described in greater detail than has hitherto been available. In addition, we analyze the independent effect of several factors of interest on the probability that a young woman will be in the labor force during various intervals surrounding the first birth.     

Complementarity of work and fertility among young American mothers

Abstract In this paper information about cohorts of young women in the National Longitudinal Survey of Work Experience is used to examine the extent to which women maintain a continuity of work attachment during their early years of childbearing, the years when traditionally they were most likely to withdraw from the work force. The results indicate that women who maintain closer ties to the work force immediately before and after their first birth are also more likely to be employed in 1978 - between five and ten years after their first birth - independently of intervening fertility events and other labour supply factors considered to be important predictors of work. The notion that work and fertility are increasingly becoming complementary activities for American women is supported by these data.     

International migration and labor force participation of married women

A focal issue in international immigration research has been immigration adaptation and assimilation and especially absorption and integration of immigrants into labor force roles. Nevertheless, such research has largely been focused on immigrant men, neglecting the systematic examination of labor force participation among immigrant women. This research is focused on the correlates of economic activity among immigrant and native born Jewish, urban, married females aged 18–54 in Israel. The specific objectives of the investigation are: (1) the impact of education, socioeconomic status, familial child care burdens, and ethnic background on the economic activity of native-born and immigrant, married women; and (2) to evaluate the extent to which the above patterns vary by veterancy and age. The data for this analysis are drawn from Israel's quarterly labor force survey of 6,000 families for 1970 and 1971. Education, socioeconomic status, ethnic origin, and child care burden were all found to have some effect on women's labor force participation; however, the pattern of effect was different for younger and older women and varied by veterancy status. Indications can be found in the data that age at immigration, or in other words the point in the women's life cycle at which immigration occurs, makes a difference in the type and strength of effect of immigration on labor force participation.Requests for reprints should be directed to Moshe Hartman, Department of Sociology, Population Research Laboratory, Utah State University, Logan, Utah 84322.     

Female work experience,employment status,and birth expectations: Sequential decision-making in the Philippines

The influence of women’s birth parity and accumulated market skills on their current labor force participation and birth expectations is examined within a sequential choice framework, Analysis of household data from the 1973 Philippines National Demographic Survey suggests these patterns: (a) women who have accumulated larger families work less in the current period and anticipate fewer additional births; (b) women with more past work experience tend to work more hours in the current period; and (c) work experience appears to have only a weak negative effect on birth expectations among older women.     

Separate taxation and married women's labor supply: a comparison of West Germany and Sweden

This paper uses Swedish and German micro data on wages, hours of work and human capital related variables for German and Swedish couples. When separate taxation was introduced in Sweden in 1971, incentives for married women to supply more labor to the market, was an important argument. A comparison with the behavior of German women, who are confronted with the high marginal taxes of split taxation, is a way of evaluating this policy. Effects of the specific tax systems are incorporated in logit analysis or married women's labor force participation. German and Swedish regressions differ significantly. Children are for example a major detering factor for German women's labor force participation but not for Swedish women.I have received helpful comments on earlier versions of the paper from Wim Groot, Christof Helberger, Notburga Ott, Robert J. Willis, participants at the European Society for Population Economics Conference and referees of the Journal of Population Economics, as well as participants of seminars at the Universities of Amsterdam, Aarhus, Frankfurt and Chicago.     

子女孩次性别结构与女性再生育——基于孩次性别递进生育率的分析

现有子女的孩次性别结构是影响女性再生育的重要因素。使用中国2000年人口普查数据和时期孩次性别递进生育指标对女性生育水平进行了测算。结果显示,女性普遍生育但终身只生育一个孩子的比例很大,基于孩次性别结构的生育行为体现了男孩偏好;城市和镇在生育第一孩时就存在性别选择;第一个孩子是女孩的女性生育二孩的可能性较大,且二孩是男孩的比例显著大于是女孩的比例;第一个孩子是男孩的城市和镇的女性大部分不再生育,而农村女性有很大比例会生育二孩,但几乎不存在性别选择。采用某地区2019年的数据进行补充验证,同样发现:只有一个女孩的女性相比较只有一个男孩的女性生育者生第二孩的可能性要高很多,以上研究发现对当前二孩生育行为具有一定的启示意义。     

The labor force implications of expanding the child care industry

This paper examines the labor force implications of increased social investment in the child care industry. We have two main conclusions to report. First, expanding the child care industry will remove a major barrier to employment for a sizable number of women. This includes women in middle and upper income families who desire to work for personal fulfillment and to improve their families' lifestyles. But even more so, it includes women in low-income and single-parent families who need to work to maintain a minimal and dignified standard of living and who might otherwise remain dependent on welfare benefits for their own and their families' subsistence. Second, expanding the child care industry will help employers cope with a range of personnel problems they will increasingly face as the U.S. undergoes a major transition in the 1990's from being a labor surplus economy to being a labor shortage economy.     

Barefoot and in a German kitchen: federal parental leave and benefit policy and the return to work after childbirth in Germany

Since 1979 German federal maternity leave and benefit policy has given women incentives to stay at home and take care of their newborn and youngest children. In 1986 this leave and benefit policy was changed in several ways, turning it into a powerful instrument for delaying mothers' return to work after childbirth. Using a flexible duration dependence estimation technique for proportional hazards due to Prentice and Gloeckler (1978) and applied to grouped durations by Meyer (1987, 1990), we estimate post childbirth return to work hazards for women during the federally protected leave protection period and immediately upon completion of this leave period. During the leave mothers are less likely to return to work the longer is the time left in the leave protection period; however, this result cannot be attributed generally to high levels of maternity benefits. When the leave protection period ends, mothers with strong labor force attachment who are still on leave return to their jobs.The second author gratefully acknowledges financial support by the National German Science Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft) (Grant No. Wa 547/2-1). The authors would like to thank Richard Burkhauser, Barbara Butrica, John F. Ermisch, Joachim Frick, Siv Gustafsson, Philip Merrigan, Johannes Schwarze, Eileen Trzcinski, Jan-Dirk Vlasblom, Gert Wagner, Sheng Zhu and two anonymous referees for their help and suggestions. Remaining errors are of course, our own. Responsible editors: Siv S. Gustafsson, John F. Ermisch.     

The German East-West Mortality Difference: Two Crossovers Driven by Smoking

Before the fall of the Berlin Wall, mortality was considerably higher in the former East Germany than in West Germany. The gap narrowed rapidly after German reunification. The convergence was particularly strong for women, to the point that Eastern women aged 50–69 now have lower mortality despite lower incomes and worse overall living conditions. Prior research has shown that lower smoking rates among East German female cohorts born in the 1940s and 1950s were a major contributor to this crossover. However, after 1990, smoking behavior changed dramatically, with higher smoking intensity observed among women in the eastern part of Germany. We forecast the impact of this changing smoking behavior on East-West mortality differences and find that the higher smoking rates among younger East German cohorts will reverse their contemporary mortality advantage. Mortality forecasting methods that do not account for smoking would, perhaps misleadingly, forecast a growing mortality advantage for East German women. Experience from other countries shows that smoking can be effectively reduced by strict anti-smoking policies. Instead, East Germany is becoming an example warning of the consequences of weakening anti-smoking policies and changing behavioral norms.     

Women’s Short-Term Employment Trajectories Following Birth: Patterns,Determinants, and Variations by Race/Ethnicity and Nativity

Despite a large literature documenting the impact of childbearing on women’s wages, less understanding exists of the actual employment trajectories that mothers take and the circumstances surrounding different paths. We use sequence analysis to chart the entire employment trajectory for a diverse sample of U.S. women by race/ethnicity and nativity in the first year following childbirth. Using data from the 1996–2008 panels of the Survey of Income and Program Participation and sample selection models, we find that women employed before childbirth show a high degree of labor market continuity. However, a notable share of them (24 %) took less stable paths by dropping out or scaling back work. In addition, mothers’ attachment to the labor force is simultaneously supported by personal endowments and family resources yet constrained by economic hardship and job characteristics. Moreover, mothers’ employment patterns differ by race/ethnicity and nativity. Nonwhite women (blacks, Hispanics, and Asians) who were employed before childbirth exhibited greater labor market continuation than white women. For immigrant women, those with a shorter length of residence were more likely to curtail employment than native-born women, but those with longer duration of residence show greater labor force attachment. We discuss the implications of these findings for income inequality and public policy.     

The effect of child care and part time opportunities on participation and fertility decisions in Italy

Economic models of household behavior typically yield the prediction that increases in schooling levels and wage rates of married women lead to increases in their labor supply and reductions in fertility. In Italy, low labor market participation rates of married women are observed together with low birth rates. Our explanation involves the Italian institutional structure, particularly as reflected in rigidities and imperfections in the labor market and characteristics of the publicly-funded child care system. These rigidities tend to simultaneously increase the costs of having children and to discourage the labor market participation of married women. We analyze a model of labor supply and fertility, using panel data. The empirical results show that the availability of child care and part time work increase both the probability of working and having a child. Received: 14 February 2000/Accepted: 20 February 2001     

Welfare state context,female labour-market attachment and childbearing in Germany and Denmark

This study investigates the role of female labour-market attachment and earnings in childbearing progressions in two very different European contexts. By applying event-history techniques to German and Danish register data during 1981–2001, we demonstrate how female earnings relate to first, second and third birth propensities. Our study shows that female earnings are positively associated with first birth fertility in Denmark, while this is not the case in West Germany. We interpret our findings based on the fact that Danish social context and policy encourage women to establish themselves in the labour market before becoming mothers, while the German institutional context during the 1980s and 1990s was not geared towards encouraging maternal employment. For higher-order births, the results are less clearcut. For Denmark we find a slightly positive correlation between female earnings and second-birth fertility, while the association is somewhat negative for third-order births. In Germany, women tend to leave the labour market when becoming mothers. Non-employed mothers have elevated second and, in particular, third-birth rates. For the group of mothers who are employed, we find only a weak association between their earnings and higher-order fertility.     

Stochastic Forecasting of Labor Supply and Population: An Integrated Model

This paper presents a stochastic model to forecast the German population and labor supply until 2060. Within a cohort-component approach, our population forecast applies principal components analysis to birth, mortality, emigration, and immigration rates, which allows for the reduction of dimensionality and accounts for correlation of the rates. Labor force participation rates are estimated by means of an econometric time series approach. All time series are forecast by stochastic simulation using the bootstrap method. As our model also distinguishes between German and foreign nationals, different developments in fertility, migration, and labor participation could be predicted. The results show that even rising birth rates and high levels of immigration cannot break the basic demographic trend in the long run. An important finding from an endogenous modeling of emigration rates is that high net migration in the long run will be difficult to achieve. Our stochastic perspective suggests therefore a high probability of substantially decreasing the labor supply in Germany.